Family.

I just went out with Iciar and Joseba. A walk through the town. Got back at 12:15am. It was great. The kids are at their grandmas and so I was free and they invited me out. They referred to me as their oldest daughter. We walked and got ice-cream. Joseba told the guy 2 scoops for me while he got 1. He’s “supposed” to be helping me with my diet… Iciar met up with us and we walked to the plaza. Talked about the food I need to learn before I leave and the cookies and American meal I need to make. We get tp the plaza and there is a mini carnival that has been out there. I take some pics. Joseba takes me to the churreria where I admit I love them. Of course he offers them to me. Nooo. Pobre Erica, Iciar says. He’s trying to make me fat! Or he’s testing me in which I am definitely failing. But we decided we would get them tomorrow. (I had churros with them my 2^nd day here). We talked along the port and went to the club and sat on the deck. Beautiful. Nice Beatles cover songs playing. It was so nice just to be with them. I felt so comfortable. We looked at photos on the phone and talked about things. My family, theirs, the kids. It was all so…idk…. “family like.” And there I was sitting on the edge of the coast in beautiful weather looking out at hints of waves and clouds and recalling how far we’ve/I’ve come. Thinking how much I would miss them. As in icier and joseba, not just the kids. Thikning how they might fell-this experience for them. And how much they have done for me. I started getting emotional. In my head. Then I started thinking how strange it was that it was almost over. No way. It really is was an other-worldly feeling. Like surely this must all be a dream. Half thinking I might wake up right then and there. A part of me wanted to say what I was thinking. But I stopped myself. Not wanting to ruin the night with awkward Spanish explaining and possible tears. They have been very good to me. What an odd thing to do, to let a random girl into your home and take care of your children, sleep in your house, eat your food, and be with you all the time. And what a strange thing for a 21 year old girl to do. Travel across the world and live with people you have never met, can hardly communicate with, agree to be part of their family through thick and thin. We are strange people. What an experience. I can’t believe its almost over. I was very sad. Yes I want t go home, yes I want to see my friends, family. I want to do things I haven’t done, eat things I haven’t eaten, watch movies I’ve missed in these last 5 months. But knowing that I might not ever see this place, these people, or experience anything like this again is a really hard feeling

Nicknames and Things

THINGS:

“Aqui, no puedes adelgazar” (Here you can’t lose wait.) You said it grandma.  – Amuma Julita.

“Lo que no te mata, endordada.” – You’re right there Spain.

They call me dormilora. Cause when I have the chance to sleep, I do.

My nicknames: Eríca. Kika. Eri (Eddy). Culo gordo. Tetas gordas. Dormilora. Comidora. Wapa.

What they taught me in Spanish class: Adios!

What it really is. “Vale, venga, hasta luego, agur!”

….That could have made my word-count-conversations sooo much easier.

I don’t and will not ever understand why at 1-2 in the morning when I am bed trying to sleep, I have to put my earplugs in to drown out the sounds of the children loudly playing outside. Whaaaa??

The day when I decide to put my baby blanket it the basket for the maid to wash. And later in the day when Joseba is taking dry clothes off the rack I swipe it and he says, "that's yours?"....ohhhh que beruenza".

It’s been a surprisingly very humbling experience. You feel very very small when you realize how big the world is. But overall it’s been a crazy adventure.

Gathering Peas.

(3 weeks left, agh!)

 Whilst telling the kids a goodnight story I get to the end where the character Shakira, a hardworking farm girl, enters a music competition where she wins singing/dancing to Waka waka, and the kids of course where dancing all around and happy. Well Leire decides to jump on top of Jon who is lying down. They are both little but it was clear Jon was hurting, a think it took his breath away for a moment. He cries. So after talking him through some slow and steady breaths I get the frozen peas to make him feel better. The kids see those peas often, it comforts them I guess. So for the next 15 or so minutes Jon lies there with the peas on his ribs and I sing nighttime songs like Raindrops on roses. Well at some point Jon rolls over to look or talk to Maia and I hear something that resembles the sounds of falling marbles. Or maybe falling peas. Yes, somehow the bag opened up and the peas fell onto Maia's bed and through the cracks on the wood floor. The light was off but I knew what happened. I tell everyone to freeze and I turn on the light and see a giant pile of small green peas next to Maia. The kids look at it and break into laughter. It was a fairly easy clean up but when I looked through the crack and saw a whole other pile on the ground. Great. So the kids insist on going under and getting them. It's a tight fit and I don't want anything to get moldy under there so at 1220am I let them cogerlos. I hear laughter, head bonking, I see random peas flying out from under, and then about every 4 minutes one of them comes out to give me a handful of peas. I am lying on the bed as both the children and I are laughing out loud. One of those my life is a sitcom moments again, it's been a while. So many minutes  later I am on my hands and knees talking through things with the kids and trying to convince them that putting frozen peas in the pants was a bad idea, and then I hear the parents come in. They look at me strange and look even stranger when they come in and see 3 empty beds and hear muffled uncontrollable laughter. They get a kick out of the situation. Eventually all the peas (so far as I know) are out and the kids are finally in bed. It made me laugh a lot. I like these funny moments with the kids.

Sevilla and Coming Home.

SEVILLA WAS INCREDBILE! Everything I thought Spain was before I came here. (Yes I am inferring Bilbao/Leketio are hardly what I imagined, I’m very aware of my ignorance on the country before). The white with yellow lines houses, flat roofs. People playing the Spanish guitar everywhere, everyone using beautiful fans because it’s bloody hott. Men with dark hair, very often slicked back. Everything about the look, the people. I loved it. We saw Alcazar Palace; The Cathedral (3^rd largest in the world) – we climbed to the top; Parasol, “Mushrooms”; ate Paella; Saw a flamenco museum and show; ate sushi; Saw the Macarena – gorgeous!; A little bit of some roman ruins “italica”; and a Bull ring tour; and watched the Athletic vs Bêtes game where we almost won. We stayed at Audrey and Jimmy Wilkins gorgeous Spanish home. They were amazing hosts/tour guides. Fed us good food and took us out. Their kids are so cute and fun.   

Back from Sevilla: When the kids get home I hear from the doorway "erriiicaaa!!" It's L. She looks at me and runs into my arms for a big hug. Oh my gosh I want to cry. This hasn't happened since the 2nd day I got here.

Later in English class I brought up that I'm almost going home. I have 21 days left. I said I was sad. Then everyone else did too. Then they all came over and hugged me. What a great a day!!!! Throughout the class they kept saying how much they liked the class and me. We were learning about what we liked to do.

'An Adventure' or 'How I Ended up Sleeping on a Beach in France'

So here goes my latest adventure… last weekend I went to France with a friend who is a fellow Au Pair here. You know of San Fermín; well every week after that for about 2 months a different city in the Basque Country hosts their ‘fiesta’. So it was in Bayonne, which is like a 2hr bus/train ride from where I live (cool that France is that close right?) It really is crazy that you can get off short bus ride and suddenly it’s a different world: the language, the people, the food (mm). It was kind of a last minute trip and we left without every finding a hostel to stay at for the night, but the crazy Spanish parents are like “oh you’re young, you don’t need a hostel, fiesta all night, sleep on the beach or meet some guys to invite you over”. They are nuts. So we take a bus to San Sebastian Saturday morning and finally get to Biarritz in the early afternoon. By the way I don’t know a word of French, I don’t know how I continue to survive my trips there. I’ve been to Biarritz before so I show Mika around the shops. Mika is a 24-year-old Californian who’s been in Spain for 2 months.

We hung out at the ‘famous surfing’ beach for most of the day, the waves were ginormous. In the evening we catch a bus to Bayonne for the fiesta. When we arrive everyone is happy, drunk, French and wearing the familiar white and red. A nice site. We go through the streets to the carnival. I love carnivals. Something about the look, the smell, the people, it’s some kind of magical. We stop and get churros because I love churros. Afterwards we walk around the old part of town. It’s beautiful. Similar to the Casco Viejo’s in Spain but a little more French and with a beautiful river running through. Each street is filled. People are dancing and singing and whenever they walk by me I pretend I know French and sing along. Everyone is in good spirits there. We make our way through the narrow streets. A few times we were packed like sardines, literally squished in as we tried to get through. Music is playing in the streets so loud you don’t have to go in the bars, which is convenient for us because we both have backpacks on carrying all our stuff. I’m sure I looked like an idiot dancing in a full backpack, but it was fun. At one point Cotton Eye Joe randomly came on and people laughed at me because I knew how to dance to it (“I’m a little bit country”…just kidding, it’s my Texas blood.)

To make a long story shorter, we spent all night walking through the streets, dancing, and meeting people (French people are extremely outgoing, very different from N. Spaniards). 4am hits and people start leaving the old part. This got me worried because we didn’t have a safe place to sleep. In Spanish fiestas the people literally do not go to sleep all night and so I was just betting on staying the streets. It was also weird because I am making all the big decisions. We first follow the crowd and get to the train station. Some harmless looking French guys offer to share and pay for a cab to Biarritz, (like 15min away) so we take it. When we get there we go to the beach, our backup plan. It’s pitch black and freezing so we decide to walk around the town where there’s some light. An hour passes and the sun begins to rise, it’s very pretty. We make our way to the beach, find a spot, lay out our towels and lie down. It’s still freezing. I fall asleep for about 30min and wake up with tingly hands. I decide I can’t do it anymore and we go to get some warm breakfast. We stay in the café for sometime until the weather looks better and then go back to the beach at about 930. It’s significantly warmer. I’m able to fall asleep and stay asleep until about 130 and when I look up the beach is packed. Mostly hungover young adults with hints of red and white on them. It was really very funny.

We get a crepe for lunch and make our way to catch the bus back to San Sebastian. We wait, and wait. The bus never comes. I call the bus hotline for help and of course they only speak Spanish. A true test of my Spanish level. I do great! He can understand me; I can understand him (more or less). In the end he tells me to ask the Office of Tourism where to catch it. My phone then runs out of money because of the expensive French charge. Well the office doesn’t know anything about the bus company. (Still a mystery.) They tell us it is safer to take a bus then 2 trains to San Sebastian. So we leave, I get a French pastry because I’m very stressed, and we make it to the station where I have to communicate with the French people through their small knowledge of Spanish. By the time we get to our 2^nd train we have an hour before our bus leaves for Lekeitio (home). Stress starts to hit. I do not want to have to try to stay the night in another town again. On that train I end up talking a solo backpacker from Canada and an old Spanish couple for a time. I was grateful for those moments of connections. Somehow we get into San Sebastian and run to the bus stop with 8 minutes to spare. It was quite the series of unfortunate events and it was the greatest relief to get on that bus. The ride home along the coast was horribly windy, but beautiful. 

We finally make it home and I sleep for ever and ever because I am tired.

Don't Make Me Cry.

Yesterday during English class the kids and I talked about how they wanted to come to my house. For the past month J has been talking about that possibility off and on and keeps asking me if he could. Of course, I say. And I mean it. We talked about my family, what we would do. How they would come when I left. Then I told them they had school so they woul come when there was a break from school. They would save up money now for the trip. We talked about it for some time. I told them that they could come when they were older to come and learn English. And maybe even they could be my cuidadora for my kids when I’m older. I got all excited thinking that maybe it could actually happen. Could it? Am I that naive to imagine that in 10/15 years I might be able to see these kids again when they choose to come live with me. Agh, I hope not. I started to get sad. And I told them that. I said I’m sad. They asked why, and I said that I didn’t want to leave them. Then they lightheartedly said, we’ll we’re coming to your house. Oh niños. I hope you do. I thought for a moment I might cry. They might drive me nuts, and we might fight, but every now and then me and these 5 & 7 year old children have real connections. Really real.

That was funny.

We're trying to figure out what to eat for dinner. Mother is out. The dad says, in broken English, "we have a problem" (that's never a good thing) He continues: "I've had three beers. I drunk. I am drunkie." Bahaha. I laugh very hard. I end up making most of the food. Then later as he's saying goodbye to the kids and walking out the door he yells "I love you erica!"

Oh gosh...if its not the kids being crazy it's the parents. I love this family.